Questions left unanswered about Portsmouth’s budget proposal

Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk, VA)

April 04--PORTSMOUTH

Portsmouth City Manager Lydia Pettis Patton and Chief Financial Officer Alice Kelly would not respond to more than a dozen questions The Virginian-Pilot emailed about the budget proposal -- about sewer and water projects that would have to be delayed, frozen positions, cuts to the health insurance and risk management funds, or to the sustainability of the budget.

Acting Deputy City Manager LaVoris Pace said in response to The Virginian-Pilot's questions that the newspaper had been given a copy of the proposed budget and a PowerPoint presentation.

"As is standard with municipal government, the city manager's presentation and distribution of budgetary information provides transparency to the citizens of Portsmouth," LaVoris said.

Here are some of the questions left unanswered.

Infrastructure:

1) I understand from your budget proposal that instead of funding sewer system projects at $10.7 million they are being funded at $500,000. It appears that $5 million was cut from "miscellaneous improvements -- sewer," $5 million was cut from the "sanitary sewer overflow elimination program," and $200,000 was cut from the "sewer cave-in repair" program. How can the city's sewer system handle this change? What is the rationale for eliminating or reducing these funds and projects? How will residents be affected?

2) Miscellaneous improvements -- sewer $5 million: Do you have any concerns about Portsmouth's sewer system, of which over 72 percent of it is at the end of its useful engineered life? If so, what are they? If not, why not? Will there be overflows which create public health and environmental problems, as the budget proposal mentions? If there won't be any money for these "small repair projects" how will the city prevent overflows?

3) Sanitary sewer overflow elimination program $5 million: Do you have any concerns about cutting this budget? If so, what are they? If not, why not? According to the budget proposal, this program is to reduce the overflows of sewage from infiltration or inflow of ground or rain water into the city's sanitary sewer system as required by the Federal Clean Water Act and under the voluntary consent order with the State Department of Environmental Quality. So will Portsmouth fall behind on its plan and possibly end up with sanitary sewage overflows?

4) Sewer cave-in repair $200,000: This program aims to maintain Portsmouth's sewage system by providing the replacement and rehabilitation of minor segments of the "failing" sewage system. Sewer failures can cause overflows that create public health and environmental problems and problems with streets and properties. Do you have any concerns about reducing funding for what sounds like a much needed program? If so, what are they? If not, why not?

6) Dr. Patton, obviously you were faced with a tight budget, could you explain in more detail why these projects were ones you felt you had to cut?

7) Dr. Patton and department heads, if the city didn't regularly transfer more than $9 million from public utilities operations to the general fund, would you have the money to do more of these projects? Why has the city chosen to take money from public utilities to cover general fund expenses?

8) Do you have any concerns about the balloon payment in 2020? Because of proposed cuts next fiscal year, now the projected costs for 2020 are $67.6 million.

Water:

1) Will the city's Downtown Master Utility Replacement Program remain on track? (It looks like nothing was budgeted and nothing was cut.)

2) Will the city's Lake Kilby Replacement Filters 1-10 remain on track? (It looks like nothing was budgeted and nothing was cut.)

3) Infrastructure improvements, 14-14: According to the budget proposal, 63 percent of Portsmouth's neighborhood water and sewer infrastructure is past its useful life and poses potential water quality problems. How will cutting $2 million from this program affect residents in Portsmouth? Do you have any concerns about not replacing and rehabilitating water and sewer infrastructure throughout the city?

4) Miscellaneous water work, 14-19: Do you have any concerns about reducing funding for routine replacement or rehabilitation of the water system components, which are not in the Neighborhood Replacement Program? If so, what are they? If not, why not?

5) Water tank rehabilitation, 14-21: Are you concerned about not rehabilitating or repairing parts of the city's six water storage tanks? If so, what are your concerns? If not, why not?

Frozen positions:

1) What positions would remain frozen under the proposed budget? Last year, the city froze $1.6 million worth of positions, which was roughly 73 positions, including 43 from public safety, according to information I got from Judy Duffy. Are all of these positions still frozen? Could you give me the total number of frozen positions and specifically the number of frozen police, fire and 911 positions? (Or could you give me a spreadsheet that gives the entire breakdown?) It is unclear from the budget what is frozen. I assume the positions on page 3-14 are proposed authorized positions and don't subtract vacancies.

Recreation:

1) What is the thinking behind removing $1 million from recreation center enhancements? Why do this?

Sports Hall of Fame

1) Is it correct that of the $350,000 listed as funding for the Sports Hall of Fame, $250,000 is from the state and $100,000 is from the city?

Truxtun fire station

1) Was there any discussion about adding a Truxtun fire station to the budget? If so, what was it? I see that it is not mentioned.

Savings:

1) It is unclear to me where all the savings are in the budget. Are there some budget savings that you could point out to me?

Health insurance, risk management and revenue

1) What percentage of the fiscal year real estate assessments have you budgeted as real estate taxes? A $1.8 million jump in real estate revenue is quite a jump, so I am curious if you are making different revenue assumptions than in previous years. If so, why?

2) What percentage of the fiscal year real estate assessments did the city budget as real estate taxes in the previous year?

3) There is a $4 million reduction in the health insurance fund expenditures from actual spending in 2015 to projected spending in 2017. Why does the city assume it will spend less on health insurance in 2017 as health insurance costs generally rise across the U.S.? Will the city be pushing costs off to the employees or reducing benefits? Will the city be dipping into its general fund balance to cover costs if they rise above the projection?

4) There is a $2.7 million reduction in risk management spending from actual spending 2015 to projected spending in 2017. Why does the city assume it will spend less on risk management -- legal and workers' compensation claims? Will the city be dipping into its general fund balance to cover costs if they rise above the projection?

5) By budgeting less for the health insurance fund and the risk management fund than was needed in 2015, is this an artificially balanced budget?

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